Poetry of consciousness

I think dreams were created for us to enjoy or to suffer more artistically. So every night when without notice I fall one more time on the slippery slide of consciousness into the borderless lands of my dreaming world, I always find something interesting waiting for me there.

Sometimes it's just a vast pasture. But the grass is not green. Instead, it's vibrating with all the colors of the spectrum at once. I know. But, when you're dreaming it's all natural. On that endless pasture for ghosts various dialogues between my dream-self and my friends, my relatives and numberless whoevers take place. Now, this is when things get mind-twisting. In my dreams (which are supposed to be happening in my mind) I also have experiences of outside and inside my mind. For instance, I may talk with someone, but at the same time think something else, in my dream-mind. Wrap your head around that one.

With this dreaming business it almost feels like I'm living two lives: one stable and purposeful(sort of), and the other flickering, chaotic and unpredictable. But more poetic. Come to think of it, we can say that real-life is God's prose and dream-life is God's poetry. And we're some sort of pen.

At other times, I have dream deja-vu's. I'm in my dream, and I experience something that I am absolutely sure it happened in another dream. And I become conscious of that dream-memory right in the middle of the dream. Someone is sure having fun up there!

As a final note, I want to give you a lovely little poem from the ancient Chinese poet Zhuangzi that fits the mood:

Once upon a time, I, Chuang Chou, dreamt I was a butterfly,
fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes, a butterfly
I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was Chou
Soon I awaked, and there I was, veritably myself again
Now, I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man

Shifting path

I am peacefully strolling on the beach. Now and then, a sweet-and-salty breeze is charging my batteries with optimism and tolerance. Up on the cliff there's a fancy hotel, especially built for superstars, double-dealing politicians and the occasional business-man cheating on his wife. Inside, shuffling like termites in a fresh nest, an assortment of brown-nosed waiters, doormen, room-servicers, janitors, clerks and their slick managers, making sure everybody sucks up to the right side of the guests, those fuckers! But let's stay calm.

The beach is full of butts, legs, breasts and chests frying in the sun changing positions so as to all get their fair-share of sun splash. I am lazily treading ahead, with the sandals swinging in one of my hands, on the narrow part of the beach where sea and shore have been meeting since the beginnings of the Earth. Here, on this ever-shifting path, I'm in between two worlds. Now I'm in the sea, now I'm on land, now I'm in the sea, now I'm on land...

But, all of a sudden,as if in a bad and incomprehensible dream, the small waves start to boil over into bigger and bigger ones,and I find myself knee-deep, then chest-deep, then mouth-deep in the gargling masses of sea-water which are now rapaciously stealing more and more land. And all the butts, legs, breasts and chests lying in the sun were taken by surprise and are now desperately running around in the growing foams, colliding with one another, creating a muddy havoc of screams and splashes on what, just a few minutes earlier, had been a serene and peaceful beach.

The waters are now above my head and no matter how hard I try to swim my way back to solid ground, where you can stand, breathe and pass judgement on superstars and politicians, and business-men who cheat on their wives, and doormen, the far depths of the sea are reeling me in like a naive and insignificant fish fooled by its irresistible hook. And away the sea takes me, and the waves start to fight amongst each other for their prey.

Long gone is the safety of the shifting path, on the edge of the sea, where I felt protected both from the menacing depths of the sea and from the back-stabbing joviality of the populated land.

Sounds in the dark

There was something prancing around in the woods of my youth.

I had felt it in those late nights when we would all gather up, pick up some cheap, homemade liquor and trek up the hill to the Stone Bull ravine, in the pitch black of midnight. We were many, so the subliminal terror of being alone at night in a dark wood was masked by our loud chatterings, the twinkling lights of our cigarettes and, more than anything, our absolute denial. We were many. And we were men.

I don't think you can really imagine how it feels to be so close to absolute loneliness in a dark, open space, when nothing stands between you and Evil. Because the fear of loneliness is not about loneliness at all. It is about fearing another being. Everything you hear, you actually see in your mind as something attacking you from behind. You look up. There's nothing there but the sick stars. Barely flickering through the weird, hand-shaped branches. They are cracking in the chilly winds. You realize that they have become your only ambassadors, desperately pleading the heavens for mercy. But then the anguish retreats into the bushes. You're safe. You're with friends.

And you are many. And you are men.